


A Series of Unfortunate Deaths

by succulentfather



Category: Ghosts (TV 2019)
Genre: Graphic Violence because I included some deaths, maybe it'll get sad we'll see, there is some swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 01:26:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 5,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25915090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/succulentfather/pseuds/succulentfather
Summary: A collection of little one shots of each of the main ghosts in the aftermath of their death.
Comments: 44
Kudos: 92





	1. Robin

The full moon scattered light across the clearing in the wood. Prehistoric birds called out from the highest branches and the rustle of midnight wilderness filled the ambience. 

The last thing he remembered was the beast towering over him. It’s jaws ajar, it’s teeth sharp and threatening, that deafening roar. 

He awoke with a start and grunted in disorientation. Sitting straight up, he found himself in a pit amongst offerings of meat, crude jewellery and weapons. He grunted again and frowned, climbing out of the pit and noticing the moon above. He panted in excitement and-

“MOONAH!” he cried with joy. 

He began to chant and turn on his heel... then stopped. It didn’t quite compute in his head. There he stood looking down into the pit, and there he was, lying dead in the pit. He yelled in confusion and fear, then climbed down onto his knees to get a closer look. He reached for the face and screamed in terror when his hand phased straight through the head. 

He recoiled and felt his heart beat faster and faster. He panicked and reached for a bow in the pit. His hand didn’t even manage to touch it before floating right through. He grunted and cried at the moon, hoping it would give him an answer. 

“Moonah?” A single tear began to trickle. 


	2. Humphrey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Used a bit of old English in this so hopefully its understandable.

The executioner readied his axe in his hands as Humphrey tentatively knelt before the wooden block. 

“Doth thou hath any final words?” 

Humphrey gulped and looked around at the onlookers. His wife stood there in tears, a handkerchief held up to hide her distraught face. He looked back up to the executioner’s masked face with determination. Something deep inside him hated that he was too cowardly to show his face to the man he was about to murder. 

“Thou shalt taketh my life with the knowledge I am an innocent man.” Humphrey stared daggers into where the man’s eyes would undoubtedly be. 

There was a short pause as the executioner hesitated, “May god hath mercy upon thy soul.” 

He lifted the axe and Humphrey rested his neck on the block. It was quick, one slice clean through. There was a wailing scream from his wife and a murmur of disgust from the other onlookers. 

And then he had expected nothing. He had expected black, and then the pearly gates of heaven. Instead, he was still there, lying on the floor. Something was different though. 

He looked up from his position on the floor to see his wife staring at something above her, but he couldn’t turn his head to see. That’s when he realised he couldn’t feel his body. 

“Oh my Lord! I cannot feel my body!” Humphrey started to panic in fear and confusion. 

Try as he might, he couldn’t move and he cried out for his wife as the congregation in front of him walked away. 

“How doth I still live?” Humphrey cried, “Surely mine own head hath been cleaved from mine own body! Where art the pearly gates of the afterlife?” 

As he heard the faint patter of footsteps behind him as everyone walked out of earshot, he noticed someone coming towards him; he squinted to try and see. It was a man, or almost a man. Half man/half ape almost, clad in an array of miscellaneous furs and sporting a head of nest-like hair. He grunted excitedly. 

“Sir? I say, sir?” Humphrey called out to get his attention, “Doth thee speak English, sir?” 

The grubby man skidded to his knees and leaned as close to the ground as he could to come level with Humphrey. 

“Yes, I speak.” the man’s gravelly voice replied. 

“Pray, what is happening?” Humphrey began, “Wherefore did they leave me here? I cannot move. Who art thee?” 

“I dead.” the man tried to explain with his clearly limited vocabulary, “Thee dead. This after.” 

Humphrey frowned, “How am I deceased and yet I still live and speak?” 

“No live. Dead.” the man reiterated, “OH!” 

The man’s attention was pulled by something behind Humphrey. He clambered to his feet and excitedly shuffled out of sight. 

“Sir, I say, what art thee doing?” Humphrey asked as he heard scuffling behind him. 

The scruffy ape-man began to chuckle and Humphrey saw ten grubby fingers close around his eyes. 

“Unhand me you knave!” He felt himself being picked up. 

“Look!” the man grunted and uncovered his eyes so he could see. 

His own body, standing before him, but missing a head. 

“Thee dead.” the man repeated himself and thrust Humphrey into the arms of his own body. 

Humphrey tried to grasp a mental hold of the situation as he watched the ape-man visibly form a sentence in his head. 

“We, uhhh,” the man started, “dead. But, not all dead. We stay, watch them.” He gestured to the house, “We make sure, when they dead, they go to light. They no see us. We, uhhh, we-”

The man trailed off, trying desperately to find the right word. 

“If they cannot see us, and we art dead…” Humphrey started to put two and two together, “... art we phantoms? Cursed to haunt the living?” 

“Phantoms!” the man cried as he remembered the word, “No cursed, just dead.” 

“I see.” Humphrey sighed as he felt his body grip his head tighter. “Well then, doth thee have a name?” 

The man frowned in realisation, then he shook his head, “No remember, long time ago.” 

“I shall have to call thee something, if we art trapped in purgatory together.” Humphrey began to think, “How about Robin? Tis a substitute for Robert.” 

The man beamed with joy and grunted happily. Robin it was. And then Humphrey’s body dropped him on the gravel. 


	3. Mary

The darkness that surrounded her slowly started to fade back into daylight. Her vision was blurred but she recognised the pyre upon which she stood. Memories started flooding back; the chanting of the angry mob, the tight rope around her arms and wrists, the flames licking around her until all she could see was smoke. 

The stench of charred wood filled her nostrils and she opened her eyes wider, trying to focus them. The ropes that had previously bound her hands were gone and she noticed something crisp, black and human-shaped by her feet. 

Then it hit her - how was she alive? She remembered the excruciating pain as she burned and burned, the flames showing no mercy. Surely this must be Hell for she had burned as a witch. 

“Robin, behold!” a man’s voice shouted to her right, which was followed by an excited grunt. 

She turned to the voices to see a beast-like man dressed in furs folding the decapitated head of a nobleman. She yelped in fear as the head began to speak. 

“You there, lady! Come hither!” the head called out to her, “We shall tell all.” 

“Be yous demons or angels?” Mary questioned them while tentatively stepping down from the pyre. 

“Neither!” the head replied, “We were mere mortals such as yourself before we arrived at the plane of purgatory.” 

“Purgatory?” Mary repeated, “I burned for witchcraft, I haths been damned to eternities in the pits of Hell.” 

“Robin, do you wish to explain?” the head looked up to the man holding him. 

“Me Robin, this Humphrey.” the man known as Robin smiled at her, “We phantoms, thou too. We dead but stay here. Help others to light.” 

“Phantoms?” Mary echoed again, trying to process what Robin was saying. 

“Ah, watch!” Robin got excited and handed her Humphrey’s head. 

He then rushed over to the smouldering pyre and reached his hand out until it phased right through. Mary yelped in shock, dropping Humphrey, and Robin chuckled giddily. 

“The devil’s work!” she screeched and scurried away. 


	4. Kitty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to get the dialogue period-accurate, but I couldn't find much on the mid 1700s general English that would have been appropriate, so it might sound a bit Tudor-y.

Mary stood over the poor girl as she lay there at the bottom of the steps. Nothing had quite prepared her for the blood-curdling scream that preceded the girl’s demise. 

It might have been the tight corset, or the long skirts that caused poor Katherine to trip, but there was no doubt now that she lay dead on the bottom step, having hit the back of her head on a bannister on the way down. Mary took a perch on the step next to her; she remembered Robin telling her about people going into the light and she figured Katherine would want some company to reassure her before she ascended. She would definitely ascend, Mary was sure of it. She was the brightest soul she had ever seen. 

What she hadn’t expected was for it to take a while. There was only the chef and a single butler in the house while Katherine’s other family and social peers were out on a day trip, so her body wasn’t found for a good while. She began to think Katherine’s soul had ascended without her noticing, and she was just sitting there beside an empty corpse. With her head resting in her hands, Mary dozed off without realising. 

Maybe it had been ten minutes, or an hour, or two, but Mary was violently awoken by a wailing screech that sounded familiar. 

**

Kitty really couldn’t believe what she was seeing. She couldn’t move, frozen on the spot in utter terror as she stared down at herself. She tried to remember how she had ended up there; a trip, a stumble, the back of her head…

Kitty reached for the back of her head under her wig and felt a pronounced indent in her skull, but no blood. She frowned as she looked back down at herself at the bottom of the stairs, a pool of crimson liquid surrounding her head like a cursed halo. As her brain tried to figure out what was happening she became overwhelmed with emotion. 

Then she began to cry, because what else was she supposed to do? She hadn’t even noticed the soot-covered woman sat beside her. 

**

Mary scrambled to her feet and stared at Katherine bawling into her hands. She looked from Katherine to her body on the floor, and back again. She understood. 

“Shes not gone to the lights.” She muttered to herself. 

Katherine must of heard her because she looked up from her hands to Mary, “Who art thou? Why doth I lie dead?” 

Mary felt herself drawn to her and she placed a calm and reassuring hand on her shoulder, “I am Mary, and we’s are phantoms. We’s are souls that have left our bodies but nots travelled into the lights.” 

“Pardon?” she didn’t quite understand. 

Mary just smiled, remembering how she herself had felt almost a hundred years ago. She took Katherine in both her arms and held her tight as she continued to cry softly. 

“I knows it is hard, ands sad, ands scary.” Mary whispered to her, “But we’s have no choices.” 


	5. Thomas

BANG!

His pulse blared loud through his ears as they began to ring. He couldn’t quite believe it. He struggled to catch a breath in this moment of shock and utter fear and he fell to the ground. His vision began to phase in and out and he moved a shaky hand to his abdomen. He croaked as he called out for someone, anyone to help him, but there he lay alone on the floor of the library bleeding out. He passed out before the adrenaline could wear out and the searing pain of a bullet to his stomach could kick in. 

Then almost as soon as he was engulfed by the darkness, he was conscious again. He groaned and rubbed his eyes as if he had just awoken from a very comfortable nap, but then the memories began flooding back to him. He sat up straight in a panic and took in the library around him. He reached for the wound on his stomach to find it open, having stained his waistcoat red, but not actively bleeding. No pain either, and he climbed to his feet completely baffled. 

Something echoed from the next room and he spun on his heel in fright. In doing this he spotted a body on the floor, a body that definitely shouldn’t have been there given that he was standing right there, living and breathing. A body that was his. He had never seen himself from this angle, but it was definitely him, a pool of blood underneath and seeping into the floorboards. He felt the urge to cry out in desperation and confusion, his mind racing at a million miles an hour. His body had a mind of its own and he felt his knees buckle under him and he collapsed to his knees. He felt numb and sick. 

“Robin, if you do not put me down right this second you shall regret it when I have my body again!” A muffled voice called out on the other side of the door, which was followed by a thud and a pained groan. 

He didn’t recognise the voice and frowned as he clutched his side subconsciously. All at once a grubby man covered in wolf skins walked through the wall and stared at Thomas, then at his duplicate body dead on the ground. 

“Oh.” His gravelly voice grunted as he returned his stare to the ‘alive’ Thomas, “You no see light?” 

“What light? Who are you?” Thomas almost implored, as if this primitive being was an omnipotent presence, “Am I dead?” 

“Ah.” the man realised what was happening and lifted a finger before walking back through the wall. 

Thomas squeaked in shock and backed away from his body to lean against a bookcase. He heard a ominous girly giggle from beside him and looked to his right to see a Georgian woman poking her head through the solid bookcase, staring at him. He cried out and tripped backwards. He felt a cold shiver race though his entire being as he fell over… onto the other side of the bookcase. 

“How!?” Thomas cried in shock as he realised he had just phased through a physical object. 

“Oh, I apologise.” The woman said, taking her head out of the bookcase and wiping the smile from her face as Thomas stood up, “Did I frighten you? I hadn’t realised you weren’t dead long. You must still be in shock.” 

Thomas gaped at her, then at the bookshelf and he pointed to it, speechless. 

“Ah yes, look.” she smiled kindly and showed him her arm going through the bookshelf, “You are not the same as them anymore. They cannot see us, we exist differently, you see.” 

“They?” Thomas asked, desperate for more answers. 

“Yes, they.” she said matter-of-factly, “The people who are alive.” 

“You mean to say that I- we have passed on?” Thomas tried to piece it together, “How do we still walk on the ground and breathe the air? You say I am dead and yet my heart still beats in my-”

Thomas reached up to his chest to feel his heart and he stopped; no pulse. The source of his life had ceased between one beat and the next. His face fell and he felt his being lose all hope. 

“I am so sorry, Thomas.” the woman placed a calm hand on his shoulder. 

Thomas looked to her and frowned, “How do you know my name? Who are you?” 

“My name is Kitty and I have been in this house for almost 80 years, Thomas.” she explained, “I watched you grow up, we all did.” 

“We?” Thomas’s brow lowered even more. 

As if right on cue, a thundering set of footsteps sounded behind Kitty and the caveman wearing fur trundled back in, carrying a decapitated head… which was complaining very loudly. Thomas felt the breath sucked from his lungs as the head scolded the man. 

“You just take it upon yourself to carry me where you like with no consideration!” the head yelled, “You do not even bother to bring me to my own body!” 

“Your body drop you anyway.” the caveman grunted back. 

“Ah, fair play… oh!” the head resigned himself, and then noticed Thomas in front of them, “Thomas! How did you-” 

“BANG!” the caveman echoed the sound of a gun and pointed to Thomas’ bullet wound. 

“I see.” The head replied, “Well then, Thomas, I suppose we shall introduce ourselves. This beast here is Robin-”

“-Hey!”

“-and my name is Humphrey. As you can see I was decapitated.” he finished. 

“Aha.” Thomas said quietly to himself, trying to take it all in. 

A wailing woman’s voice suddenly called from behind Thomas and a woman covered in soot walked through the wall, “Whats happenings? Oh Thomas! Thats not fairs, purgatory no places for a sweet boy likes yous.” 

“None of those were plural but-” Thomas muttered  unintelligibly , then louder, “Purgatory?” 

“Yes.” Humphrey replied. 

“Eternal purgatory?” Thomas inquired. 

There was only a positive grunt from Robin followed by, “So far.” to confirm. 

Thomas collapsed into a chair behind him, overwhelmed. Kitty suddenly cried for him to ‘be careful’, but it was too late and he fell through the floor with a high pitched screech. 


	6. Fanny

Fanny couldn’t sleep. She kept playing it over and over again in her mind, unable to stop. She would never look at her husband in the same way again. If she could connect with her common sense right about now, she would be calling the police and have all of the arrested, but this was her husband. They had been married for decades and she hadn’t even had an inkling that her husband could have been this  _ ill _ . She watched out of the bedroom window overlooking the vast garden and sighed, conflicted in her emotions. 

Silently behind her, the door to the room opened slowly and in walked her husband, George. Quietly, but efficiently, he tip-toed towards Fanny and lifted his hands up behind her. 

“George?” She moved to turn around after hearing a slight creak in the floorboards. 

Almost as soon as she had spoken, George grabbed her by the shoulders and shoved her through the open window. She screeched and wailed in fright and toppled over the threshold and onto the hard gravel below. 

**

All the ghosts gasped in shock from behind George; they really hadn’t expected him to go through with it after overhearing him talk about it earlier. George peered over the window sill to make sure she was well and truly ‘kaputt’ before shrugging the jacket on his shoulders and sauntering back into the house. 

The ghosts looked at each other in shock and collectively peered over the windowsill to get a look. Kitty immediately looked away in distress and Mary reassured her. Robin grasped the sill like a five year old trying to see over a counter and Thomas looked down like a librarian throwing you a look over her glasses. 

“I swear nobody can hear me.” the grumble of Humphrey sounded muffled and Mary opened her apron to reveal him being carried in it. 

“Sorrys.” Mary apologised and struggled to lift him up, “The ladys just gots pushed outs the windows!” 

Mary placed him on the window sill and he sighed, because she had clearly forgotten he didn’t have enough of a neck to crane and have a look below. 

“Oh, you have got to be jesting!” Thomas rolled his eyes and directed the others to a familiar woman stumbling about next to the Lady’s body. 

The others peered over and sure enough, there she was. Lady Fanny Button was about to join their troupe. 

“GEORGE!”

**

She was lost for words as her vision came to and she stared in disbelief at the body before her. She looked to the window above and back to the gravel a solid twenty times trying to comprehend the situation. A scuffling behind her pricked up her ears and she spun on her heels to spot a rag-tag looking group of people she had never seen before looking at her expectantly. 

“Who on the good earth might you be?” she pulled her signature judging face, “And might you be able to explain what is happening? George!” 

“There is no use calling for your husband, Lady.” a regency-looking man took the lead, “You have died. He cannot hear you, nor see you.” 

“What on earth are you talking about?” 

“That is you, on the ground Lady Button.” a Georgian woman piped up from behind, “You are a ghost. We are all ghosts.” 

“I beg your pardon? Make sense girl!” 

“She makes all the senses, Lady.” a soot-covered woman defended her, “We’s all died and we stays here in spirit forms.” 

“This is purgatory, Lady Button.” the recency man spoke again, “We are those spirits compelled to dwell on for reasons unknown-”

“Silence! Your voice is infuriating enough without pompous poetry spilling out of it.” Fanny shut him down, and then stormed off into the house, “Now I suggest you all leave my property while I figure out exactly what is going on and give my husband a stern talking to.” 

“But he cannot-” 

“Not another word!” Fanny called over her shoulder. 

**

The ghosts sighed and looked at one another. This was going to be a hard one, and her of all people. Humphrey let out a frustrated groan from under Robin’s arm. 


	7. The Captain

He woke up coughing gasping for air, exactly how he had died. It was sudden, unexpected and painful, but swift. There was nothing he could do, nothing anyone could do, if they had found him in time that is. Instead he had been utterly alone, trying to grasp onto life with a feeble hand as blood clots clogged his heart. 

The night air around him felt different, thicker, as if he didn’t have to strain as much to breathe. Well, that wasn’t saying much as he had gotten used to straining due to the obscene amount of tar coating the inside of his lungs. He struggled to his feet and grasped at the swagger stick that lay loosely in his fingers as he regained consciousness. A strangely deep and fulfilling breath seeped into his unusually light lungs. 

“That was a close one.” The Captain sighed to himself and straightened out his uniform, looking up at the moon in the clear sky. 

He cleared his throat and tucked his stick under his arm and turned around to make his way back into the house. Damn, it hadn’t been a close one. It had, in fact, been the very opposite. He felt his very being sink in despair as he tried to grasp the fact he was looking down upon his own corpse. 

He wasn’t the type of man to immediately deny what was clearly before his very eyes. He did, admittedly, give himself a moment to comprehend and evaluate the situation before fully accepting that this was real and he wasn’t in fact dreaming. He really was dead, and whatever this was was some sort of strange afterlife. 

He cleared his throat and knelt down beside his body, holding a hand out over his chest and laying it on top. He gasped as his hand phased through and his eyes widened as he did it again. Now he wasn’t so sure he was dead. Was there a chance someone had tampered with his drink? Was this what an out-of-body experience was like? 

Out of the corner of his eye he spotted a Victorian-looking woman pass by the window and he stood to attention in alarm. A woman hadn’t been in the house for over a month, so who was that? He paused over his body, still unsure, before making a decision and stepping over himself and making his way into the house. 

He came to a back door and tried the handle, but his hand phased through just like it had before. He frowned, before slowly reaching through the glass with his whole arm. He then stepped his entire body through and turned around; how? The novelty soon wore off as he swore he spotted a wandering headless body down one of the dark and thin corridors to his right. He turned to the left just to catch the back of a swirling pink dress turn a door frame at the end of the corridor. He followed. 

**

“You cannot place the King there!” Thomas let out his frustration as the caveman across from him took another of his imaginary pawns from the chessboard. 

“No.” Robin shook his head and pointed to a specific square, “This one horse, that one king.” 

“You are useless.” The poet sighed and sat back in his chair overlooking the garden through the bay window. 

Kitty walked into the room and sat herself down by a bookcase to admire the intricate spines of the hardbacks. She had turned into the room quickly and as quietly as she could to avoid Fanny as she was in one of her moods; a gambling game between a few soldiers had resulted in a shouting match earlier that evening and she  _ did not approve _ . 

“Who on earth are all of you?” 

They all snapped their heads to the open door and stared in shock. 

**

The Captain stood there utterly baffled at the strange array of characters sat in the room before him, dressed in wildly contrasting period attires, who definitely hadn’t been in the house earlier that evening. 

“Bossy man?” the ape-looking man stood up and pointed at him. 

“I beg your pardon?” The Captain scoffed. 

“How are you- How did you-” the man in the waistcoat stood up to join him, unable to finish his own sentence. 

The Captain noticed the bottom of his waistcoat was soaked in blood and his military brain kicked into gear. 

“Goodness man! You’ve been shot!” The Captain walked over to him, but the man stopped him. 

“No! No it is- I am fine-” he explained, which only caused more confusion, “Did you not see your body?” 

“Sorry?” The Captain replied. 

“You do realise you are dead?” The woman in the pink dress stood up, “Don’t you?” 

“Well, outside I-” The Captain began to recount as his mind caught up with himself, “The body laid outside, it was me but, but I presumed some fool had spiked-”

He trailed off and noticed the sympathetic look in all their eyes. 

“We are ghosts Captain.” the recency man said, “And now so are you.” 

The Captain realised he was letting his guard down and showing a bit more emotion than he should and cleared his throat, “Good Lord. Well then…” 


	8. Pat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just to preface I did barely any research on medical practice so all of the stuff in this chapter is probably definitely inaccurate and just for dramatic effect ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

The blare of the bus horn rang through his ears. It was the only thing he could hear as the pain in his neck suddenly vanished. His brow furrowed and he came to, opening his eyes to find he was still in the driver’s seat, but sprawled over the dash. The horn immediately stopped. 

He squeezed his eyes shut and took in a big gulp of air; something’s off. 

He pushed himself up off the dash and swivelled round in the seat. Standing up, he reached up slowly and felt that the arrow was still in his neck. What? Where did the pain go? A minute ago he was in agony from trying to pry the thing from his throat. 

He rested a hand on the open door of the bus and heard commotion outside. All of a sudden his thoughts move to the boys. Daley! 

Pat stumbled clumsily off the bus and tripped as he stepped onto the grass, “Boys?” 

He walked round the side of the bus to see an ambulance parked in the middle of the archery range. Two paramedics were knelt next to someone attending to them and the boys were gathered round. Awful thoughts ran through his head; what if one of the boys got hurt? Was his son the one on the ground? 

As he got closer, Pat noticed another group of people peering over the scene. They looked like they had all stepped out of their own individual period drama. He paused for a moment, but he returned his attention to the paramedics before any of them noticed him. 

The first paramedic, who was quite burly began to speak, “Should we try and-”

“No.” the other replied, “Move him and we risk doing more damage.” 

The first put his fingers down onto the arrow to get a closer look at the wound. Pat felt everything drown out, his vision began to tunnel, the only thing he could see was the man between the paramedics. 

Him. It was him. How could it be him? He was standing right there over them! 

“Oh my God!” Pat couldn’t help but exclaim. 

The troupe of strangely dressed adults looked up to him and the greying man in an army uniform cried, “Blimey!” 

Pat didn’t pay attention. He was overwhelmed with fear and panic and confusion all wrapped up in worry for the boys having to watch this. He stepped in front of them and tried to speak to them, but they didn’t notice him at all. 

“Boys, I’m right here, look! Daley, come on. Look it’s your poor old dad! Patrol I-” Pat stopped as his voice cracked and it began to sink in that he might actually be a ghost. 

**

They didn’t want to interfere, this was something the guy was going to have to figure out on his own. The other ghosts watched on sadly as the man known as Pat tried to get the attention of his son. 

Thomas leaned through the Captain and Fanny, “We should really-”

“Don’t.” The Captain held out his stick against Thomas’ chest to hold him back, “You’ll make him more confused.” 

**

“No pulse! Defibrillator now!” the first paramedic called out and the second rushed into the ambulance to retrieve it. 

“Dad!” Daley cried out, but was held back by one of his fellow scouts. 

The paramedics prepared the defibrillator, “CLEAR!” and shocked his body on the ground. 

Pat watched in horror as the electricity surged through the body. He felt a tingling sensation in his chest and lost his footing as the paramedics gave his body another shock. He cried out in pain. 

Pat internally begged them to stop from the pain, but there was so much of him that wanted them to bring him back around. He didn’t want to be dead, not now, not in front of his Patrol. 

They tried again, coupled with CPR, but to no avail. He sat there on the grass, utterly distraught at the sight of his own dead corpse lying there. He stood back up slowly and turned to his boys. Daley was in tears, and all of them were frozen in shock, like what had happened in front of them wasn’t real. 

**

Kitty couldn’t stand it. She couldn’t bear to watch as the man just sat there. She pushed past Fanny and trotted over to him. 

“Katherine, don’t!” the Captain called after her, but she was already there. 

“Hey.” she slowly sat down next to Pat and gently placed a hand on his shoulder. 

Pat flinched and his eyes widened in shock. He opened his mouth to ask any number of obvious questions but she spoke first. 

“I know it’s difficult.” Kitty gave him a sympathetic smile, “I’m a ghost too, we all are.” 

She gestured to the other ghosts, who reluctantly acknowledged with little nods and waves. 

“A ghost?” Pat’s voice cracked a little as he repeated. 

“Yes.” Kitty confirmed, “We’re going to take care of you from here.” 


	9. Julian

“Fucking hell.” he sighed. 

Julian’s reaction to his own death was surprisingly underwhelming. He had cried buckets for his grandmother and had turned into a recluse after his father’s car accident. To be utterly honest, he really hadn’t thought about his own death that much. Not even the manner in which he had wanted to go. It probably would have been a boring answer anyways, like silently in his sleep at an old age. 

Well, there was no point in thinking about all that now, because he had snuffed it and was currently standing over his own slumped corpse hanging over the side of the bed. Julian scratched the neck of his head absentmindedly and put his hands on his hips to let out another disappointed sigh. The kind of sigh a teacher (probably on their second hip flask) gives to a class of rampaging 5 year olds that won’t sit still. 

He tried to rack his brains and play back what had just happened, trying to figure out how the hell he had just popped his clogs in the middle of… 

“Good Christ!” 

“Language!”

“I think it is quite justified at this very moment, Fanny.” 

Julian snapped his head up to see an army Captain and a noblewoman in an Edwardian dress staring at his dead body on the bed. He looked to the door and saw that it was still shut and bolted from when he had locked it not an hour earlier. 

“How the hell did you two get in here!?” Julian cried, realising his bottom half was on display and he hastily did up his shirt buttons. 

“Good Lord.” The army Captain averted his eyes and the noblewoman widened hers in disgust. 

“Make yourself decent, boy!” the woman cried at him. 

The tone of her voice reminded Julian of his mother and he scrambled to the floor to try and pick up his suit trousers that lay on a chair behind him. For a moment, he felt his hand grip the cloth and, as he began to pick it up, it dropped through his fingers and back onto the chair. He frowned and tried to pick it up again, which was when he accidentally put his whole forearm through the back of the chair. He screamed in shock and stumbled back. 

“Ah, you might want to-” the army Captain gestured to Julian’s legs, which were currently stood  _ inside  _ the bedside table. 

He screamed again and stumbled into the centre of the room, “What the hell is going on!?” 

“It seems you have had an unfortunate demise.” the woman pointed out, to which he internally groaned, because if he had wanted to point out the obvious he would’ve just used his damn eyes. 

“That much is clear.” Julian tried to spill out as much sarcasm as humanly possible while he still tried to comprehend what had just happened. 

“And now you are a ghost.” the army Captain added. 

Julian scoffed, “I’m sorry?”

“You should be.” the woman rolled her eyes, “Defacing my house with your-” 

“Your house? I think you’ll find the deed in my name.” Julian retaliated. 

“I think you’ll find the name of the house mine!” she barked back. 

The army Captain took the opportunity to step between them, “Both of you, stop!” 

“Wait, Button House.” Julian realised, “Lady Fanny Button. You’re the old woman that got shoved-”

“Less of the old, you disgustingly rude man!” she spat at him. 

Julian ignored her and turned to the Captain, “So I’m really dead. Like actually completely dead?” 

“I am afraid so.” he sighed in reply. 

Julian pinched the bridge of his nose and turned back around to look at his corpse. Shit. 


End file.
